State of the Vector Map

[Kaiser Ometeotl I]

Yeah, that's kinda how I read the comment. We don't want to send the wrong impression. Elwynn has become independent, we don't want people to think we are trying to deny that. It's why I archived the forum, so it was clear we aren't trying to claim their lands. I'd love to see this project expanded to include other nations. Hell, I'd love to see the MCS take up this map.

Maybe when Shyriath comes back, and gods hoping the files are alright, we can start to internationalize this project. Get other nations signed on so we can get them on this, as per their MCS claims. Then we can present a finished map to the MCS, with any luck.. they might make use of it.

At the very least we might get some people to help Shyriath with the work.

[Andreas the Wise]

Gralus would love a vector map, particularly if I could figure out a program that works in vectors.

[CJ Miller]

Inkscape.

CorelDraw.

Adobe Illustrator.

And most likely scads others.

[Kaiser Ometeotl I]

Excellent....Now I just need to find the time to play with them.

[Shyriath]

Back, finally.

So, yes: The map files are all okay. All the rest of my files are too, actually, because for once I had the foresight to get them all backed up, but the map files are especially so because they weren't on the actual computer at the time.

Second, the state of the map: It's been a while since I've posted a production map, hasn't it? I'll do that later tonight. I should warn you: for right now, Shireroth is going to look... not-as-nifty as it did, since at the moment I'm square in the middle of redoing borders.

As for everything else: all the landmasses but Sypyr and Cibola are on there. Once those and the southern icecap are finished, there will be more time for adding nations. Antica, as some of you might have gathered, is already on there, though it's probably not up to date with some of their more recent territorial changes. I've always intended to include other nations as time goes on, with the eventual goal of being able to at least mirror the MCS claimsmap. It was indeed more of an advanced-phase thing, but the wrapping up of the landmasses should leave more time for it.

If anyone can help me out, I'd be happy to have them do so; but I should issue a point of warning. I can export the map files to .svg, and in doing so their appearance has so far seemed to remain intact... but some INTERNAL features of the file do not, especially the most useful ones like layers, without which I wouldn't be able to keep track of things. Also, there are some features of CorelDRAW I've come across that I haven't had a chance to test with the format. So this leads me to a few conclusions:

1. To best take advantage of the format I've been doing my actual work in, any helpers might have to have CorelDRAW of a fairly recent version.

2. Because a recent version of CorelDRAW is not likely to be cheap, the main way of getting out of this is likely to be switching to .svg as my main working format.

3. Switching to .svg completely, while improving cross-compatibility, has its downsides: the layers would probably have to be rebuilt, .svg files are much, much larger than Corel's native .cdr files, and I don't know whether CorelDRAW is fussy about directly saving its more advanced/useful features into something that isn't its native format.

4. ...Godsdammit.

Also, I'm going to have to consider the matter of hosting. Google Sites, I think, doesn't provide much space for free, and space is going to really quickly become an issue as the file size for the .svg files goes up, and especially if I start producing separate files for specific projects (nation-specific or area-specific or even city maps, for example).

[Harvey Steffke]

How big of files are we talking here, like ballpark?

[Kaiser Ometeotl I]

Programs can be.... acquired. Are they bigger then bmp?

[Shyriath]

Maps posted. Production map here, vector file here. Keep in mind, if you look at the vector file directly, that it still contains some obsolete stuff.

The .png maps that are for production usage have been in the range of 3 to 4 MB. I don't see them getting much bigger, unless I change the size or resolution I've been exporting at.

The .svg files aren't dependent on actual dimensions, but (if I understand them right) they are seriously dependent on the number and complexity of the objects in them, so the file size should keep going up as time goes on. Right now, it's at about 11 MB. It hasn't gone up as much lately as I would've expected, so maybe I don't have to panic about hosting just yet.

Nonetheless, the exported Photoshop sets I did a while back are also taking up space, as well as an assortment of smaller files; I have 100 MB total, if I recall, and as things stand now I'm using about half. If I restrict myself to hosting only the .svg and the main production map, and maybe a few files for Photoshop modification, then I might be okay for the forseeable future; I'm just worried about what will happen if this takes off in a big way.

[Kaiser Ometeotl I]

Right.. that's a lot of file space... Where'd 'goldshire' go? Or was that not on there previously. Still awesome regardless of my confusion.

[Andreas the Wise]

Shyriath - Enrique from Alexandria was offering free webhosting to micronationalists, since he has a TB and never uses more than 1% of it. I'm fairly sure he'd be delighted to host your vector maps for you.

[Kaiser Ometeotl I]

That's a lot of space/bandwidth.

[Shyriath]

Hmmmmm... There's a thought...

[Shyriath]

Quick update:

Might not be able to post the actual file tonight, but been doing some big changes.

Bad news first: we're going to go backwards for a while, aesthetically speaking. The color-contoured-boundaries subdivisions, while they seem to be generally agreed upon as awesome, have been giving me serious technical problems. The Contour tool in CorelDRAW is very, very sensitive to the way you created the space you're applying it to. Even an extremely small irregularity in one of a subdivision's edge nodes can prevent you from applying a contour to it without an error message; but that's not too bad, that's just a matter of figuring out which node is giving the program a fit and deleting or fixing it.

The REALLY bad part is when it allows you to apply the tool but then commits weirdnesses with it; in particular, suddenly deciding that your shape should not be filled with white in the center, but entirely with one of the contour colors instead. That's already happened with the isle of Benacia, but that was small enough that I could fiddle with the settings a bit and leave at that. This time, though, it happened to the area that is currently Brookshire; that is, everything that's on the Benacian continent and that doesn't belong to Kildare or the Imperial County and isn't going to Elwynn. There's something about the shape of the subdivision that is freaking CorelDRAW out, and I can't figure out why; and the result is that either that portion is going to be an embarrassing shade of pink and everything else will have to be redrawn to match, or it can't have a contour AT ALL, and neither can anything else (again, in order to match). I opted for the latter, because it's simpler and I can be sure it'll work.

So, long story short, nations are going back to solid colors like on the MCS map, unless and until I can find out what the hell's happening, or at least a different way of making it look more visually appealing.

Now, for better news:

-Shireroth is nearly redrawn with subdivisions as new basic units. I may have to get definitive and final statements as to which chunks belong where... Not just "as they once were" kind of statements, because half the time I don't remember what duchies had what.. I'm not going to exclude lower-level units like the old counties if people want them shown, but they're no longer highest priority as far as prominence.

-I've started adding in the territories for other nations, also in solid colors. I'm starting with the nations on Benacia and Apollonia, plus our (hopefully) new allies in Nelaga. Just territories for now, but next step will be cities. From this moment forward, I'm going to be trying to keep a closer eye on the MCS claimsmap updates so that I can stay synchronized with them.

-Elwynn is now depicted as a separate nation, because 1) it seems likely that it's going to happen regardless, and 2) there's general agreement on what the boundaries are going to look like when it does. Should the situation change, I can re-edit as necessary. Insert statement here about this being for the convenience of the Director of Cartography and not the official policy of the Imperial Government, etc.

[Kaiser Ometeotl I]

Excellent.

[Shyriath]

Production map updated. Note that city and geographic name layers were turned off for this particular version.

Further changes since last time:

-I did a lot of changes under the hood, so to speak. You won't see much difference, but suffice it to say that I've cleared away a lot of unnecessary layers and duplicate objects. This will be more apparent in the vector file; I haven't uploaded it yet, but the file size dropped from nearly 11 megs to about 6.5.

-The last landmasses and the southern icecap have been drawn in. At some point I'm going to want to do a layer for a vector version of the MCS physical map, but besides that we should be broadly done as far as geography. Still, the landmasses may be refined later on, which leads me to...

-I have high hopes for the Mango-Garp Accord and its passage through the Landsraad. With this in mind, and noting the part that says "The Island of Amity shall be the first professionally developed map for the UMapper Cartography Project, and both nations shall retain control over the rights and development of that map", I have put in a yet more detailed coastline for Amity, as well as for its sister isle of Mirioth (and associated islets). These things should now be visible in the production map. As for things that will go on the detailed map, I am also in the process of shifting the towns slightly to match said coastline, as well as slightly modifying the rivers and adding river names. And I plan on adding roads as well, if I can get some input about where they should go.

[Shyriath]

Production map updated. I've been busy with it, despite the silence here; many more nations added (the continent of Eura will look a bit odd, because I'm in the middle of working on it), and in some places where there are no nations you may see some topography introduced (Leng in particular). Nations done so far should be synchronized with the MCS map of 9/12/10.

Also, keep an eye on this thread in Nelaga for the work I've been doing on the Amity map.

[Jonas]

Edit: No problem about Mons Clistiro. Also, let me know if you ever do find that link...

Finally found it (Spangle had moved it from server): http://dr-spangle.com/Archives/Apollo-s ... eroth.html

EDIT: And http://dr-spangle.com/Archives/Apollo-s ... start.html ...

[Shyriath]

Oooh. I vaguely remember those maps. And here's the close-up of Lake Christoph with islands, too...

[Jonas]

Oooh. I vaguely remember those maps. And here's the close-up of Lake Christoph with islands, too...

Yes, that's the one I meant when I talked about small isles.

[Shyriath]

Once I resolve some other issues with Inkscape, I'll figure out how to put them in.